24 along, keeping our dIstances on either side of it, and then he would abruptly cross it in ways a little like the cheer- ing and singing-always a trifle wrong. Tiny things. Far back Out of the blue, he would give me a gift I didn't want-something expensive. Once, when I was perishing for a crystal radio set, he gave me a WInchester .22. I hadn't the remotest interest in rifles, but he was a very good shot. I remember when he decided to buy my Boy Scout uniform. The local dry- goods store handled the standard arti- cle, the kind my friends all wore. Father brought an outfit from Indian- apolis that made me look like Sir Robert Baden-Powell reduced in scale. I never wore It. He always did these things in a rush, with a kind of eager- ness, and afterward drew back across the same old space. But maybe I didn't do much to keep him on my side of it. Or to cross to his. Just mdybe, I didn't do anything. Now down the swooping parabolic staIrcase. Unless they have changed the carpet in the past year, it is rusty gold. StIll, I am not in total darkness. A luminous drift seeps in from the moon, or the city, or the Michelangelo docked next door. The place is full of tiny sounds, caused by I don't know what- some of the crew in their quarters, the joints of the ship greetIng the mid- night tide. It is strange to have lived- I would call it a life, even if only a brief one-in these surroundings, and to come back to them like this. The main lounge. We would meet here for coffee and cognac after dinner, bringing the story of the hour we had spent apart: a man at Lavinia's table had said that Shakespeare "lived and died without tasting tea or coffee. It's something to think about." And a woman at mine was annoyed with the Mediterranean. She had expected to see both shores while the ship proceeded down the middle. Her agent had not prepared her for mere horizons. A rangv Swedish lady brought her own hors d' oeuvres to the bar in here each day at cocktail tIme-biscuits, cheese, and artichoke hearts. We talked with her often, and with the nun who was on the go day and night, festooned with cameras and lenses when she wasn't playing ping-pong, and with the blond actress who earnestly re- peated the story of how her car keys were once stolen by a Gibraltar ape. I had a feeling of life that I had thought was behind me forever. I trotted out all the worldly lore I possessed and all the reputable things I had ever done and offered thenl for Lavinia's aston- A DR.EAM OF INNOCENT OR.GIES OR, THé MOST UNFORGé TT AßLé CHARACTéRS I Né VéR Mé T I'm glad I wasn't ever a Clyde or a BonnIe, But I'm sorry I was never a stage-door Johnny. I'd love to have driven down the Gay White Way In a hansom cab with a big houquet To share a bottle and a Chicken Kiev With a Mitzi Rajos or a Fritzi Scheff Or a Trixie Friganza- To squire such dames as, GlIttering names as, Mitzi Hajos, Fritzi Scheff, Or Trixie Friganza. Had I been born just a little hit earlier, When ladies of the choru" were voluptuously girlier, I'm sure I could have fostered in a manner deft A brotherly acquaintance with the second from the left But I'd rather have waIted for a real bonanza Like a Fritzi Scheff or a Trixie Friganza Or a Mitzi Hajos- To spend my patrimony Skirting matrimony With a Fritzi Scheff, A Mitzi Hajos, Or a Trixie Friganza. I' d have overtipped the doormen underneath the canopies Of elegant cafés from Rector's to Bustanoby's. They'd warn me when a menace appeared upon the premises- Say, a gentleman name of Harry Thaw or lady name of Nemesis When I heard the chimes at midnight with a Mitzi Hajos My conduct would have been I hope outrajos . . . All my salad days, Mardi Gras gala days, With a Mitzi Ha jos, A Fritzi Scheff, Or a Trixie Friganza. Had I only been twenty Instead of ten, I'd have been a legend in Manhattan then, But temptation was thwarted by the simple truth: I was just too young to misspend my youth With a Fritzi Scheff, A Mitzi Hajos, A Trixie Friganza, Or even a Florodora girl. -OGDEN NASH . . ishment. And I think she received them with pleasure. And then-I left the ship at Naples. Oh, that was where I was bound, all right, but I believe I came close to going on to Genoa with her. It could have been arranged. We could have had one more dav. What J came over me that I didn't go to Genoa? I don't remember I must try. , S O I am looking for Lavinia as well as for Father . For him, or his presence, on this ship tonight, and for her in a past just out of reach. They connect. I feel that they connect, and I suspect that before cockcrow does come I will find out where and how. It is strange that, up there in the LIdo Bar, I should have forgotten the one visit he ever paid me. It was the year after I was last home-'64? He ..., \ ttf \f, '. l' ...'c ..t-. t . \." " '.;" "C..1 . '\:--f (. ,.,,\' '\ :t- ):,': ::"... l \t : :\%;{ ' 't.. t .. ..: "t ..(4.: ..... -)... <II "IJ..:-" -H-ÞM